This version of the sampler has a new back cover and a new sidepanel on page 12. The new text reads: “No need for Spandex or Lycra, bike to work in ordinary clothes. Start with short trips.” It then links to the Clif Bar 2milechallenge website.

The acerbic and entertaining Stuff White People Like blog has linked to a t-shirt being offered by FatAmerican.tv. All profits from sale of the shirt will go to a non-profit org nominated by readers of SWPL.

Send an email to stuffwhitepeoplelike@gmail.com with “Non-Profit SUGGESTION” as the subject. Include a link and a short description of the organisation and their work. How about a bike non-profit?

What White People Like has previously taken a loving potshot at bicycles:

“A good place to find white people on a Saturday is at a Bike Shop. Bike shops are almost entirely staffed and patronized by white people!

“They love expensive Road Bikes and the accompanying spandex uniforms. This enables them to ride long distances and wear really tight clothes without any social stigmas. These types of riders will spend upwards of $5,000 on a bicycle and up to $400 on accessories, but will not ride to work. Perhaps because they cannot wear the spandex. It is important that you never question why someone needs a $5000 bicycle since the answer is always ‘performance.’

“But there is a special category of bicycles that appeal far more to white women, the European city bike. White women have a lot of fantasies about idealized lives, and one of them is living in Europe and riding around an old city on one of these bikes. They dream about waking up and riding to a little cafe, then visiting bakeries and cheese shops and finally riding home to prepare a fancy meal for their friends who will all eat under a canopy with white Christmas lights.

And of course, it goes without saying that white people who ride bikes like to talk about how they are saving the earth. If you know a person who rides to work, you should take them aside and say ‘Hey, thanks. Sincerely, The Earth.’ Then give a thumbs up. That white person will ride home on a cloud.”

“The ‘Smart Car’ isn’t smart; it gets the same fuel efficiency as other economy cars but only seats 2 passengers. When compared to bicycles, all cars tend to look down right idiotic. Where’s the logic in working tons of hours to pay for a car to get to work to pay for a car? What’s the sense in driving to the gym to pay a membership to get some exercise?

“Move within biking distance to work, sell your car, cancel your gym membership and start living smarter. Increase your quality of life while not contributing to the political, environmental, social calamity created by the world’s dependency on oil.”

Happy New Year. 2009 will be a corker, I can feel it. And here’s how bike-filled it’s going to be. I’ve placed a bunch of bikey dates into an online calendar, which you can subscribe to. Once you’ve added it to your iCal calendar or Google Calendar, all new dates and date changes are handled automagically. Pushed to our iPhone via the cloud, that sort of thing.

There’s a Google calendar button on the left. If you’re not already a Google member pressing this button will prompt you to become one.

Flick through the months on the calendar below and you’ll see 2009’s trade and consumer shows, major events – such as the Tour de France – and lots of other notable stuff. It’s by no means a complete list of every bike-specific date, there are many regional Google/iCal calendars which can fill in the gaps for you.

However, if you feel there are some international, or important national, bike events that ought to go on this calendar, please email the missing events, and their dates and URLs. Thanks.